Navy Uses Depth to Down All Six Crimson Boats

Two years ago in Annapolis, Navy raced to victory over the Harvard varsity lightweights in the last 500 meters of the race. History repeated itself on Saturday when the Crimson fell to the Midshipmen—and Georgetown—in the final stretch of the race to relinquish the Haines Cup.

Navy swept all six of the afternoon’s races in a dominant display of team depth. Harvard and Georgetown split second- and third-place finishes throughout the day.

In the varsity race, the Crimson battled throughout and even managed to pull even at the 500-meter mark. However, strong sprints from the Midshipmen and the Hoyas led Harvard to finish in third place.

“It was certainly a disappointing loss,” junior coxswain Kevin He said. “But it was a good, strong race, and we rowed well in waters rougher than we’re used to. Now we know what to work on coming out of this race.”

The varsity eight fell behind off the start and found itself about half a length down from the Navy and Georgetown boats at the 500-meter mark. At this point, He called on his crew to begin an aggressive middle-1000 sequence and to take seats against the Midshipmen and the Hoyas.

“Last week at Dartmouth, we had a really good push at 500 meters, so on Saturday at the 500, I said, ‘We’re four seats down. It’s now or never—how much do you really want this?’” He said. “We took a 10 there where everyone focused and responded really well.”

The push allowed the Crimson to pull even with the rest of the field and all three crews came across the 1000-meter mark of the race even.

With about 700 meters left in the race, the Navy and Georgetown crews both pushed away from the Crimson. Both crews had a bow–to-stern lead on the Crimson by the 1500-meter mark. Harvard clocked in at 6:15.6, coming in third behind Navy, who clocked in at 6:10.9 and Georgetown, who finished in 6:13.2.

The second varsity boat fell to the Midshipmen but handily defeated Georgetown in its race. The crew started off strong, only losing one seat to the Midshipmen. Though the Crimson was down throughout the race, the contest remained tight until the end, as Harvard always remained within striking distance of the Navy crew.

With 650 meters left in the race, sophomore coxswain Dexter Louie made the decision to start the sprint sequence early in order to make up the three-seat deficit.

However, the Midshipmen sustained the Crimson’s attack well and countered with a sprint of their own in the last 200 meters of the race.

“Navy countered our sprint really well,” Louie said. “They just opened up in the last 20 strokes to a length. Most of that length came right at the end with that sprint of theirs.”

Harvard ended up finishing the race in second with a time of 6:23.3, behind Navy’s 6:19.5. Georgetown finished third in 6:29.0.

The freshman eight placed second ahead of Georgetown by .05 seconds in its event, clocking in at 6:26.7 to the Hoyas’ 6:26.75.

Next Saturday morning, the team will compete against Yale and Princeton for the Goldthwait Cup on the Charles River.

“It’s one of our favorite races,” He said. “Historically HYP has generally been a really close race and it’s the last race before Sprints. Everyone comes out with their best race so we’re looking forward to putting in a really solid effort next week.”

—Staff writer Lucy D. Chen can be reached at lucychen@fas.harvard.edu.